A STAGGERING £150m has been conned out of Greater Manchester families over the last year by fraudsters offering too-good-to-be-true deals.

A STAGGERING £150m has been conned out of Greater Manchester families over the last year by fraudsters offering too-good-to-be-true deals.

Shocking new figures show the size of the problem, involving mail fraud, telephone fraud and sophisticated internet scams.

Callous crooks are now using all kinds of devious schemes to trick their victims out of their hard-earned cash including international money transfer operations, instant money makers and pyramid schemes.

It is thought the fraudsters rake in an average of £850 per con and 125,000 people have been targeted over the year.

In recent years tens of thousands of people across Greater Manchester have fallen victim to the conmen, and a recent high profile case saw one woman duped out of £30,000.

The woman was conned after receiving an e-mail on her home computer claiming to be from the wife of the ex-president of the Philippines.

It asked for help to collect a £13m family fortune allegedly smuggled from the Philippines to Madrid and a percentage was offered to anyone who would help collect the cash.

But after sending her details and a total of £30,000 and then flying to Holland to pick up the cash she was told she had been hoodwinked out of her money.

Elaine Hewitt, of the Citizens Advice Bureau in Greater Manchester, said: "We regularly see people who have been conned out of hard-earned cash by an internet scam promising something for nothing, announcing they have won a prize, or asking them to confirm confidential bank account details.